Common Dental Social Media Questions – Answered

Common Dental Social Media Questions – Answered

In our various webinars, we hear numerous questions about how to utilize Facebook and Twitter and other popular social media channels. Because the questions are so great, we wanted to share them with you in hopes that you’ll also find them helpful!

Questions about Facebook:

1. “Is there a way to capture emails or other information about people who visit and/or liked your posts or your page?”

Facebook is not allowed to share information that would help identify the user, rather, the user must decide if he/she wants to share that information with you. One way a user might share their contact information is if you decide to advertise and ask for that information through a form.

2. What is Facebook’s profanity filter? Should you keep it turned on or off?

According to Adweek, “[Facebook’s] profanity filter… will block the most commonly reported words and phrases marked as offensive by the broader community. Admins can set the profanity filter to strong, medium, or none, though Facebook does not provide a list of exactly what words will be filtered under each setting.

It’s recommended to turn it off, as turning it on can accidentally restrict engagement on your page. Instead, try modifying “visitor posts” settings so you can review what people post on your page, or block overtly offensive words under “page moderation” (found under your “settings” tab).

3. What is the best day and time to post on Facebook?

This answer is different for everyone. Find out by visiting your Insights tab to learn when your followers are online by selecting “posts” in the left-hand column. There you will see a dashboard labeled “when your fans are online.”

Questions about Twitter:

1. Are you required to tweet a certain amount of times in an interval to stay active?

No. The key is to tweet consistently. It is recommended that you tweet at least once a day.

2. Tweeting once per day and posting three days a week is significant. How do you recommend having something valuable to put out there?

There are a lot of ways to continue sharing valuable content. Turn a blog article into 3-4 different posts, spread out 6 weeks apart. Find articles pertaining to your industry online and share them, and post your advice/opinions on it. Post updates about your practice. Share funny stories. Testimonials. Search #hashtags to see what kind of questions people are asking and answer them. View your follower’s demographics to guide your topic decisions, which can be found by viewing your Twitter analytics dashboard.

3. What is the value of Twitter to a dental practice? Are my patients really on Twitter?

Twitter’s demographics range from business owners to teenagers. You can attract new patients by posting content that would interest them such as articles about new dental office equipment, practice updates, tips on whiter teeth, and other topics that your target audience would enjoy.

4. Is there anything you can do to make your Twitter page pop up when people are searching for a dentist in your area?

Twitter does not directly influence your rankings in local search results.

Questions about content:

1. When you Google pictures to go with a social media post, do you have to give credit for the photo?

You should credit content that is not your own by tagging the Facebook page or Twitter profile of the source. Example: photo cred: @AP

2. What are the best ways for posts to have the furthest reach?

Use photos/video. Social media algorithms reward multimedia posts and are therefore more likely to show your content to followers.

There’s no hard and fast rule, but we recommend sharing three posts from other sources to one original post.

For nearly two decades, we have helped thousands of dentists successfully market their practices online. To learn more about social media marketing, download our whitepaper, Running a Practice in the Age of Social Media using the form below, or call (888) 932-3644.